Effectiveness of Human Relations in the Banking Industry
Chapter One
Aims and Objectives
This study is intended to address myriads of objectives which include:
- To find out how human relations have improved the level of standard of performance.
- To find out how human relations have assisted in achieving effectiveness in management.
- To discover, the effect of supervision and or group performance of management.
- To make concrete, advice or suggestions on how human relations can be used for an effective banking industry.
- And to promote a reference point where future researchers or students can draw inspiration for their intellectual nourishment.
CHAPTER TWO
Concepts and Development of Human Relations
In the word of Jone et’ al (2005) Human Relations movement advocates the idea that supervisors behaviourally trained to manage subordinates in ways that elicit their cooperation and increase their productivity.
According to Bateman and Snell (1996). Human Relation approach is aimed at understanding how psychological and social processes interact with the work situation to influence performance.
Human Relation was the first major approaches to emphasize informal work relationship and workers satisfaction.
“Human problem” become as important as the “Machine problem” or the sales problems.
The key concept of human relations can be said to be that, productivity and employee behaviours are influenced by the informal work group, cohesion status, and group norms determine output. Managers stress employee welfare, motivation and communication. Social needs have precedent over economic needs (Bateman & Snell 1999).
The emergence and development of human relations can be traced back to 1920s – 1955 in fact it emerged from a research project that began as a scientific management study. This approach owes much to other major school of thought for example, many of the ideas of the Gilbreths (scientific management) and Bernerd and Follet (Administration management) influenced the development of human relations (Bateman & Snell 1999).
Advance in the science of man, and his behaviour as an individual and in group, e.g. psychology, sociology e.t.c. have reveal a number of factors which helped business and industrial problems. The basis of the human relation movement was the integration of various disciplines i.e. industrial psychology and sociology, applied anthropology and social psychology and was concerned with the human problems which management encountered (Appleby 1980).
The Hawthorne Studies and Human Relations
Perhaps the most important contribution made to management during the human relations period came from the experiment of the Hawthorne plant of Western Electric Company. This experiment have become widely known as the Hawthorne experiment. They revealed that an organization was more than a formal structure or arrangement of the functions. Mayo wrote “(An organisation) is a social system, a system of cliques, grapevines, informal status system, virtuals and a mixture of logical, non-logical and illogical behaviour” Hicks and Sullet (1981). The research provided some of the most interesting results in the history of management (Bateman and Snell 1999).
To increase efficiency, the researcher studied ways to improve various characteristics of the work setting such as job specialization on the kinds of tool workers used. One series of study conducted from 1924 – 1932 at the Hawthorne work of the Western Electric Company, with the recent publication of the research findings. It revolutionized management thinking by focusing attention on the component of the job and work satisfaction on the part of employee (Jones et’ al 2000).
The research included people from the National Researcher Council, the Harvard Business School and the Massachusett Institute of technology.
Among the people who wrote about the Hawthorne experiment was Elton Mayo (1888 – 1949) who is often quoted as having been a leader of the researcher. However, there appears to be some doubt as to the extent to which Mayo was actually innovated in conducting the experiments and his exact contribution to the human relation movement. There were five phases of the Hawthorne experiment.
- The illumination experiments
- The relay assembly experiments
- The interviewing programme
- The bank wiring observation room
- The final study (Cole 2000).
CHAPTER THREE
RESEARCH DESIGN
Research Design
Is the structuring of investigation aimed at identifying variables and other relationship to one another. This is used for purposes of obtaining data to enable the researcher test hypothesis.
The aim of this study is to determine the “Effectiveness Of Human Relations In The Banking Industry” A case study of Guaranty Trust Bank Plc Kaduna.
Research Population
Population is defined as a collection of individuals items, either of things or people with common characteristic (Banda 1992). In order words, a population is any group of individuals that are of interest to the researcher, it is the totality of the group a researcher wants to study.
In this case the management and staff of Guaranty Trust Bank (GTB) constitute the population for this study which are over 100 personnel in the organization. The entire population will not be used in the collection of data, the data collection will be within the management and staff of the organization.
CHAPTER FOUR
Presentation and Analysis of Data
Presentation of Data
This shows the presentation of data collected, it gives information about the nature or activities of the bank (GTBank Plc) which serve as a statement of result that summarises all the facts in this project.
The data were collected through the administration of questionnaires to the staff of GTBank with the view of getting the opinions of respondent on the effect of “human relations in the management of banking industry”.
A sample of forty questionnaires were administered to operation and marketing department of the bank, and only thirty (30) were fully completed and returned, the remaining were not completed and precisely only the returned are used for data presentation and analysis.
The data collected from the field are presented in this section, the data were collected based on “LIKERT 5 Point Grading System” under the headings of Strongly Agreed, Agreed, Undecided, Strongly Disagreed, Disagreed. It should be noted the data are presented in the manner it was collected.
CHAPTER FIVE
SUMMARY, CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATIONS
Summary
The beginning of this work gives a broad concept of Human Relation from the various experiments undertaken, it should be noted that the physical variables studied included such things as illumination, rest period, length of work period and length of week work, all in an attempt to find the optimal level of each. But as improved Human Relations, Supervising methods, social interactions incentives system and workers autonomy.
Although the Human Relations movement has its limitations, it certainly has a great influence on management programme on topics such as communication, counselling, understanding people and leadership, it was discovered that improved communication increase morale and that the relationship and participation of superiors and subordinates mattered a lot to increase production level.
Importance was attached to the management of employees understanding their psychological and social needs at work as well as improving the process of management. Recognition was given to informal organization and the complexity of needs of people, which makes them go to work not simply for monetary reward.
Conclusion
As might be expected, the intuitive argument that a satisfied worker is a productive worker, was the first one to be made, largely as a result of the Human Relations movement in the early 1930s. during the Howthorne experiment.
REFERENCES
- Bateman T. S and Snell S.A. (1996) Management – Buiding Competitive Advantage. Chicago Richard Irwin. Pp 499-508 3 rd edition.
- Koontz P & O’Donnell (1984). Human Resource Management, Strategy and Operational Performance in The Spanish Manufacturing Industry, Manage, 5(3): 175-199.
- Cole Coker (2005). Effects of Human Resources Systems on Manufacturing Performance and Turnover Performance and Turnover. Acad Manage. J, 37: 670-687.
- Jone Mike, Nick Asley & George Willey (2005). “Who Benefits from Teams? Comparing the Outcomes for Managers, Supervisors, and Workers.” Ind. Relat. 43(1): 183-213.
- Ivancevich Viker & Matteson Nice (1999). Managing human assets, New York: Free Press.
